- If you repeatedly have collagen injected into your lips and you stop, will you get stretch marks?
“Not that I am aware of, though I should point out no one injects collagen around here anymore,” Dr. Jeffrey Popp said.
“Collagen was the original filler back in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. It was cow protein, then pig protein and finally human protein,” he said. “No one uses it anymore because there’s too much chance of an allergic reaction.”
He said current fillers are quite inert, which means they don’t stimulate the immune system to attack them. So you won’t get stretch marks on your lips.
- Can you become obsessed with or fixated on plastic surgery?
It isn’t surprising the answer is “yes.”
People can become obsessed with anything. Personal appearance and cosmetic surgery are certainly on that list.
“When this topic comes up, body dysmorphia sometimes follows,” Dr. Popp said. “Individuals with body dysmorphia never see themselves as appropriate in appearance.
“So they tend to have a lot of surgeries over the years because they can never reach any level of satisfaction.”
Dr. Popp combats this by telling patients what to realistically expect.
“It’s key to my work to weed out those people who seek procedures for inappropriate reasons,” he said.
- How can facial peels that strip the skin make you look younger?
Dr. Popp said that depends on the status of your skin before the peel.
A laser peel on an 18-year old is not going to make them look 13. But if a person has sun-damaged skin – blotchy pigmentation, sunspots or wrinkles – laser peels, chemical peels and dermabrasion would all work to make the skin look younger.
“Chemical peels and laser peels work by killing off the outer layer of skin. Over time, that sloughs off to leave you with younger looking skin,” said Dr. Popp.
“With dermabrasion, you sand the skin off. In that case, it comes off as you do the procedure rather than falling off later.”
Have a question for Dr. Popp? Click on the “contact” button on the top of this page.
